John Halcyon Styn is an American
blogger,
entrepreneur, motivational speaker,
web designer,
author, and web
celebrity,[1] who "pushed the boundaries of online self-expression"[2] through his various online projects. He is currently the co-founder of 1st Saturdays,[3][4] a homeless outreach project, and the host of Hug Nation.[5]
Career
Styn worked as the first
webmaster for
Sony's Station e-commerce mall and for CollegeClub.com[6]
Styn has won two
Webby Awards, the first, as the designer and star of his personal website, cockybastard.com,[7] and the second for a Hug Nation video
podcast.[8]
Other projects have included:
Fears. Regrets. Desires, an
NBC Internet-only, confessional story-sharing show. Host.[9]
FreshRealm, a food shipping company that uses reusable shipping technology. Chief Wisdom Officer.[10][11]
Styn bought his first
URL in 1996 to put his self-published
zine, Prehensile Tales, on the web.[21] This first autobiographical ezine ran from 1996 to 2000.
He first achieved internet notoriety when one of his stories got him into trouble with
Fruit of the Loom.[22] When they sent a cease and desist order on March 2, 1998 demanding that he take down a parody of their logo that he made for a blog post. The post is still [when?] up.
He is also a contributor for the Burning Blog, the official blog of
Burning Man.[23]